Touch If You Dare (43 page)

“You took my love?” Cameron leapt to his feet. “It’s mine! You can’t take it! I own love—”

Blaine knocked Cameron out with a light tap to the temple. “Shut up.”

“Jarvis?” Reina was on her knees, staring at him in disbelief. “But you’re dead.”

“Hey, babe.” He crouched beside her and his whole body came alive at her nearness. “I came back. Told you I’m hard to kill.”

She touched his face, and his soul vibrated in response. “You’re really alive? And you’re the Guardian of Love now?”

“Hell, yeah, sweetheart. I’m the whole shebang now.” He laid his hand over hers. “Yeah, I came back for you, and you showed me how to—”

“Reina!” Trinity screamed. “Help!”

They turned to see Natalie and the Godfather going at it. Full-on naked tango. Natalie was screaming and her body was on fire.

“Oh, God. I’m too late,” Reina gasped. “I can’t switch them—”

“Death can,” Jarvis interrupted.

But the most powerful being in creation was on his back, trying desperately to hold the Reap’s blade off his throat. And it was clear he was losing the battle.

“Make the Reap love.” Reina gripped his forearm desperately. “You can do it.”

Shit. He probably could. Jarvis grabbed the bow from his brother and loaded it. “You love Death,” he whispered. Then he shot it.

The arrow hit cleanly in the Reap’s ass, and he leapt off Death. “Young buck! I almost killed you! I apologize profusely!”

Jarvis was stunned. He’d just created love? Not hate.
He’d just created love.
His heart began to lift, and lift, and lift—

Death scrambled to his feet, his face ashen with the realization of how close he’d just come to death. “Nice work, Swain—”

“Switch their souls!” Reina commanded as she ran toward Death. “Switch my sister and Gina! Now!”

Death looked sharply across the stage, and Jarvis saw him analyze everything that was going on. He glanced at the Reap, who was now on his knees using his cloak to polish Death’s shoes. He looked Jarvis in the eye, then he flicked his hand toward the women.

Natalie shrieked again, and then she was dead.

Reina’s soul shriveled when her sister convulsed and went still. “Natalie!” She started to run toward her, but Jarvis caught her around the waist.

“Look.” He pointed at Gina, who was now slumped in a pile on the ground, her back toward them. All Reina could see were her hunched shoulders and rounded back.

She gripped Jarvis’s hand, hanging for support as she looked between the two women. “Nat?”

Gina’s shoulder moved.

“Natalie?” Hope seized her heart, but she didn’t dare move. Didn’t dare jinx it.

“I did it again!” The Godfather let out a horrific bellow and scrambled backwards. “I am a demon! I killed her!”

“Hey, big guy.” Nigel caught his arm as he tried to
throw himself on Cameron’s sickle. “Suicide’s a little extreme, don’t you think? Chill out. Borrow my sketch pad.”

Gina rolled onto her side and opened her eyes. They were Natalie’s vibrant blue ones. Natalie’s face. Natalie’s hair. Gina’s clothes, but Natalie’s face.

Reina gaped at her, then looked back at the woman beneath the Godfather. Gina’s dark curly hair. Gina’s paler complexion. “But—”

“Our souls define us,” Jarvis said quietly. “Natalie’s soul was switched with Gina’s, and their external appearance is changing to align with the soul within.”

“So, they got switched? Nat?” Reina inched nearer, afraid to hope, afraid to believe.

“It’s her.” Jarvis gave her a light push. “Go to your sister, sweetheart. It’s over.”

Natalie grinned, her tears sliding down her cheeks. “It’s me, sweetie. You did it. You really did it!”

Reina knelt beside her and searched those familiar blue eyes in a body that was still wearing Gina’s clothes. “How do you feel? Did you take the poison with you?”

Natalie shook her head. “There’s this great silence inside me, like this other being that’s been in my body all these years is gone. It’s just me.”

“Oh, Nat!” Reina threw her arms around her sister and hugged her. Unable to let go. Unable to stop the flood of tears. “I love you,” she said.

And she really did, in a way she’d never before allowed herself to love. Her whole body was vibrating in a way she’d never felt, not even when Cam had shot her with the arrow. She’d thought she loved in the past, but she’d been holding back, hamstrung by the fear of loss. But right now, in this moment, she was letting herself truly love her sister. She’d proclaimed love all this time and she’d been a fraud.

But not anymore.

Trinity crawled over to them, sweat pouring down her face. She said nothing. She simply wrapped them both in a hug and held them.

It was over.

***

“You’re shitting me. You’re the Guardian of both now?” Nigel studied Jarvis’s sword, which was still pink and black. “How come you’re not destroying yourself?”

“Because love is stronger than hate. I’ll keep myself under control now. No more explosions.” Jarvis’s throat was thick with emotion as he watched the three women embrace. He could feel their love, and he’d never felt it before. Nothing like this. He was used to feeling hate. Not love.

It was unsettling as hell, and there was a gaping emptiness cleaving his chest in half.

Because he’d blown it.

He’d had the chance with the girl, but he’d been a stupid bastard and rejected her faith in him. He’d died on her instead. He’d betrayed her, failed her, and abandoned her. She’d recovered and moved on, put her love into those who hadn’t let her down.

“Tell her.” Blaine set his hand on his shoulder. “You look far too pathetic and weepy staring at her like that. Recite her a poem or something.”

“That’s quite a moment. All that tenderness. I need to paint that.” Nigel pulled out a paper and a sketch pad. “Black and white will have to do.”

Blaine nudged Jarvis. “Just do it.”

He wanted to, but his feet were stuck to the ground. He didn’t know what to do. How to handle it. The emotions flooding him were too unfamiliar. Too confusing. All he knew was that he wanted to hold her forever. He couldn’t think past that.

Reina turned toward him, then she smiled. She held up her arms. To him.

“Sweet Mother Mary. That’s for me.” He couldn’t believe it.

Blaine slapped him on the back. “Go get her, big guy, before she smartens up.”

Jarvis took a step, and then another, and then he was sprinting across the stage. He caught her in his arms and hauled her against him. He buried his face in her neck and greedily breathed her in through every pore in his body. Vanilla, strawberries, and that scent that was just her. He tangled his fingers in her hair, desperate to hold her. To never let her go. “You brought me back,” he said, his voice hoarse. “I came back for you.”

She pulled back, searching his face. “What do you mean?”

“God, woman. Don’t you understand?” He framed her face with his hands. “You showed me that there’s love in me, that there was something redeemable. You brought that side of me to life. I used it to come back and to harvest my brother’s love. It’s you, babe, it’s all you. You made me the man I never thought I could be.”

She frowned. “So, you’re not hate anymore?”

“Oh, I’m hate. But I’m also the Guardian of Love.” Shit. He was going to have to spell it out, wasn’t he? But he didn’t know what to say. Desperate for her to understand, he grabbed her hand and pressed it over his heart. “This beats for you. No one else. For you.”

Her face lit up with the most magical smile he’d ever seen. “That’s love, Jarvis. You love me.”

The words felt like sunshine beaming down on him. “Yeah, yeah. I do.”

She stood on her tiptoes and lightly kissed him. “I love you, too.”

“Like you love everyone?” He knew the answer, he was sure he did, but he had to hear it. Because his woman loved every freaking thing on the planet, and she’d already told him before that she’d loved him the same way she’d love her damn dog.

He didn’t want to be her dog.

She smiled. “No, not like anyone else, you goof. Just like you.”

And in that moment, he became the man he’d been trying to be his whole life.

A warrior who was stronger than hate.

A warrior who knew that his most powerful weapon wasn’t his sword.

It was his heart.

When he bent to kiss her, he was so psyched to kiss his woman that he almost didn’t hear the cheers and the chants of “Guardian of Hate for the Testosterone Award” from the packed stadium.

But he did hear them. How could he not? After a lifetime of being tortured by women, hated by many, and burdened by the knowledge he could destroy the world in a single moment of weakness, he was now loved by a goddess, kissed with tenderness, and hoisted as a hero?

Sometimes, it just felt good to be a man.

With Reina snuggled in his arms, now was one of those times.

***

“Dude, that’s some kind of trust you got going on,” Nigel said. “I’d never let a woman blindfold me.”

Jarvis grinned as he allowed Reina to lead him down the sidewalk. He still couldn’t get over the freedom of being able to stroll down the street without worrying he might accidentally brush against strangers and trigger a fistfight. Yeah, the hate was still brewing, but he was getting pretty good at calling on the love to balance it.

Cameron was on a walkabout, pouting that world peace was no longer on his agenda. The love spells he’d cast on Natalie, the Godfather, and Reina had disappeared the moment Jarvis had harvested his love, and Cameron was rockingly pissed about it. Jarvis was planning to let him stew until he was well-cooked, and then he’d try to bring him back toward the decent kid he once knew.

Which meant, for now, Jarvis had only one agenda, and that was to enjoy the hell out of every moment, every experience, and every touch with the woman who had loved him into salvation. “You need to meet the right woman, Nigel.”

“No woman is that right,” Nigel scoffed. “Hell, man, doesn’t the blindfold remind you of the time that Angelica—”

“Stop.” Reina’s voice was firm. “You aren’t in the Den anymore, Nigel. Stop torturing yourself.”

“I wasn’t the one who did the torturing,” Nigel muttered.

Jarvis scented chocolate and was tempted to sneak a peek under the edge of the blindfold. “Are we going to your store?”

“Next door.”

Jarvis tried to remember what stores had been adjacent to hers… no clue. Last time he’d been there, he’d been tunnel-visioning for a woman to save his brother, not window-shopping.

“Okay, in here,” Reina said. “Let me get the door.”

“This is the big surprise?” Nigel started laughing. “You’ve got to be kidding, Reina. There’s no way he’s—”

“Shh! Don’t give it away!” There was humor in Reina’s voice as well, but it was also filled with warmth.

Jarvis couldn’t stop his shit-eating grin as he followed her inside. He couldn’t get over how good she made him feel. If she was giving him pompoms, he might even sign up for cheerleading lessons.

Cool interior air blasted him, and he smelled chemicals. And pomegranate. And lavender. He sensed the energy of dozens of people, all of it warm and positive. A shitload of love in that room. What the hell?

Nigel was laughing his ass off. “Wait ’til you get a load of this, Jarvis. Holy shit, never trust a woman. Isn’t that what I said?”

“Nigel!” Reina scolded. “You can wait outside if you’re not going to be quiet.” Her fingers gently worked at his blindfold. “Ready?”

For some odd reason, Jarvis’s heart began to race. He caught Reina’s hand just before she loosened the blindfold. “No one has ever given me a present before.”

“Then it’s time.” She dropped the blindfold.

For a moment, all Jarvis could see was a roomful of people. Blaine, Trinity, Death (who had finally pried the Reap off his shoes when Jarvis had cut off the love spell). Also present were Rocco, Sylvan, Damien, and a dozen others. Christian was noticeably absent, confining himself to sick bay management. He’d been looking more gaunt and becoming more withdrawn with each passing day since they’d rescued him, and they were going to stage an intervention if he didn’t start improving soon. They were all worried about him, and Jarvis didn’t like the fact he hadn’t made it here.

Napoleon wasn’t there either. He’d shown up at Fenway Park minutes after the event had cleared out, pissed as hell and searching for Augustus, but all they’d been able to find of the missing assassin was an ear and three toes. Napoleon had bellowed something unintelligible about betrayal and taken off to find Napoleon, and they hadn’t heard from either assassin since. Angelica was still incarcerated, and that was the important thing.

Jarvis saw Natalie was standing to the side. Fear still haunted her face, and he knew she wasn’t healed. Not emotionally, and he knew what that was like.